Exile

By: Richard North Patterson

Narrated by: Dennis Boutsikaris

Length: 20 hrs and 49 mins

Publisher's summary

From one of America's most compelling novelists comes the mesmerizing story of a lawyer who must defend the woman he loves against a charge of conspiring to assassinate the prime minister of Israel

David Wolfe's life is approaching an exhilarating peak: he's a successful San Francisco lawyer, he's about to get married, and he's being primed for a run for Congress. But when the phone rings and he hears the voice of Hana Arif—the Palestinian woman with whom he had a secret affair in law school—he begins a completely unexpected journey. The next day, the prime minister of Israel is assassinated by a suicide bomber while visiting San Francisco; soon, Hana herself is accused of being the mastermind behind the murder. Now David faces an agonizing choice: Will he, a Jew, represent Hana—who may well be guilty—or will he turn away the one woman he can never forget?

The most challenging case of David's career requires that he delve deep into the lives of Hana Arif and her militant Palestinian husband, both of whom have always lived in exile. Ultimately, David's quest takes him to Israel and the West Bank, where, in a series of harrowing encounters, he learns that appearances are not at all what they seem.

Culminating in a tense and startling trial with international ramifications, Exile is that rare novel that both entertains and enlightens. At once an intricate tale of betrayal and deception, a moving love story, and a fascinating journey into the lethal politics of the Middle East, this is Richard North Patterson at his most brilliant and engrossing.

©2007 Richard North Patterson. All rights reserved (P)2007 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers LLC

Critic reviews

"Action abounds, culminating in courtroom drama." (Booklist)

"Exile is a novel worth reading by anyone who is trying to understand, at least in part, one of the Middle East's political nightmares....Through his artful writing, Patterson presents compelling arguments for both sides while avoiding a preachy tone - a pitfall a lesser writer easily could succumb to." (USA Today)

Massively biased perspective on the mideast crisis

very long waste of time. predictable, implausible and a poor attempt at personifying the issues.

exile

awesome read

Good story - narration terrible

The story was good - and a lot of the facts very close to truth eventhough a bit far fetched.....
As a Jewish Israeli it was important for me to finish the but. BUT the accents were so far from the real thing it was absolutely nerve racking and annoying to listen. There are no accents anywhere remotely similia. It was a bad Spanish accent.

Dialogue Pain

Rick Patterson took a wonderful subject, a big chunk of modern day history and turned it into a monster of a read. He admits in his interview that he left nothing out. If he traveled there, he included his location in the book. He included too much to be easily readable!

Second, Patterson's editor needs to be more vigilant in editing. I heard at least three 'he or she said sardonically' in this book and at least dozens more of the dialogue attributions. Everyone spoke quietly, earnestly, softly and sardonically until the nails on the blackboard screeched in my ears each time someone spoke.

If you saw a lone woman driving down the interstate day after daylistening to her audio tape but screaming in a silent pain, I confess, it was me, slugging my way through the book.

I was rewarded at the end with a great court room scene. I wish we would've gotten there about 100,000 words sooner.

If you have an I-pod and can listen in fast mode and skip forward every chapter or so, you too can slug through the jungle of words.

If you want great writing that tingles your toes, look elsewhere. This is a history lesson wrapped with painful dialogue. The characters are rather enteraining, at times.

Mr. Patterson needs to read Stephen King's "On Writing." Could someone tell him it's available on audio? "I learned from the King book," she said earnestly but softly in that sweet manner.

was there a story here?

This was more a political dissertation than a novel. I understand perhaps he was trying to give an inside look at the politics but this is NOT a novel.

Too Long & Politically Charged

Interesting premise to story, the Israel and Palestine conflict, but totally too outrageous to believe as the story finds a lawyer (David) defending his early lover (Hanna) of the murder of an international political figure.

The beginning of the story is very interesting, but becomes long and labourous as David visits the West Bank. The information provided during this visit is very repetitive and in my opinion very politically charged. It pretends to present both sides and while it may indeed portray what each side "feels", there's a big question as to whether this is historically correct even though one side or the other might "believe" it.

I do not recommend this book and was quite disappointed as it drug on, and on, and on. Patterson is a better writer than this and I do not believe this subject is appropriately presented in a novel.

Bad Narration

I will try to listen to this again but the narrator sounds like he is either very sad or very bored. No intonation on anything so far that I have heard.

Gave up after 7 hours

After spending 7 hours with this story, I gave up. The author tries to cram so much back story from several characters - through flashbacks - into the story that the plot looses all forward momentum. I found it a frustrating listen - lots of details that failed to come together to create a compelling story. I wish I had chosen another title from this author.

Exile

The the narration was annoying when the narrator changed his intonation and candence to speak in a womans's voice which was often. The basic fictional story was good, but the political message was repetitive, overwhelming, and pedantic.

Most aweful

Ok, I've REALLY tried but this is absolutely terrible. The narrator is a drone, he's boring and can't do characters even though he tries and gets it horribly wrong.

I have tried desperately to "listen" past his voice and have also tried to get into the book itself but I just can't. If I wanted to have a full up history lesson on the Palistinians and the Jews, I personally would have chosen a book on the topic. I am all for research but this is just too much, it jumps around and is going somewhere but it just doesn't get there. Then again, the narrator could affect it and I might be better off purchasing the book, but not now and not in a hurry either.

Personally, this was a waste of a credit and valuable megs.